1993 Nissan 300ZX Convertible 300ZX Convertible (Zunobtanium)

About

I bought this 300ZX Convertible[img]http://coasta...ile.php?id=98[/img] as a derelict hulk with a dead engine, a title issue from hell, and more back taxes due than I could believe, I found her four years before I bought her, and was hooked the moment I saw her...but I had waaay to many Z projects going on, a 240Z on a rotisserie in my one car garage, an Alpha 1 Rebody on a 280Z in the back yard, and a Datsun 200 ROadster in my storage/work space! I had never seen a 300ZX Convertible up close and personal before-and I am a Z guy! The car was well worn with dry rotted top and tires, a broken front bumper cover, missing lenses, and seriously worn interior, but it was all there, and almost all original-and the top mechanism was in great shape! I checked on on her every month or so, until one day in late November in 2008, it was now or never! I took pictures, and made the preemptive strike buy calling to take my wife and family to dinner...sneaky huh?
Any way on the way to dinner I told my wife about the rarity of 300ZX Convertible, and showed her the pictures, and covered all of the details of the car, and she sucker punched me with "if you can get it running in 30 days go for it...I was stunned, obviously she had either started taking drugs, been abducted and experimented on by aliens, or she had something she was going to hit me up for....hmmm. After I got off the floor and recovered the use of my faculties, I called the owner and worked out a deal, I picked up the keys the next day and a bill of sale the next day and towed her home, I put her in the back yard, built a two car portable garage around her, and took inventory...new tires, new top new upholstery, new carpet, new battery, new windshield, new bumper cover, new paint, new engine...holy smokes this was going to be a beautiful 300ZX Convertible! I checked on rebuilding the engine-OUCH-$7K-I looked into a JDM pull considering a TT swap and a drop in NA, After talking to a fellow Coastal Z Club member who used to work for Z1 Motorsports, he recommended I get the NA because there is a distinctly higher level of maintenance involved in addition to added complexity, and I had a budget than involved time and money! I spent three weeks researching and hounding all companies that carried JDM pulls, and narrowed it down to three low mileage engines-all were fully documented, and verifiable. I chose the middle in terms of expense $1100 shipped-26842 Kilometers. I got a video of a compression test, and one with the same style of injectors mine currently had. I went ahead and pulled everything about the maintenance of the engine from 300ZX Club and TT.net. I ordered everything to replace anything worn, in addition to the 60K Maintenance. I replaced the engine harnesses, the hoses with silicone versions, removed the EGR system, and the spaghetti of leak-prone water hoses that warmed the throttle bodies. I changed out anything that looked questionable, and swapped out the inop engine with the JDM Pull. it took me 60 days or so-I had an over loaded plate with job, small boys (1 and 3) and a wife working 6 days over the holidays, so spare moments were few and far between, but put to the best use possible-under the tent in the back yard. On the day I started her up for the first time, I had my initiation to using seafoam. I cranked her up and in minutes I could not see anything, (my first though was "all his work and this engine is a Piece of crap-then I noticed it was running like a swiss watch even with all of the smoke)but I could hear the firetruck! While I showed them there was no danger of fire, the smoke dissipated, and the car ran even better. by the time the fire department had left, the car was running with no smoke what so ever!
Ok she runs fandamntabulous! check!
Now the Convertible top...I put it down for the first time and the windows cracked and the seam pulled out-obviously I would need a new top soon!!, so I started researching, and entertaining the idea of changing the top color from Black to something else...I called and talked to everyone advertising tops, and chose the best company, them requested fabric samples.I chose a dark tan German Sonneland to get a close match to the interior. I ordered the top and put it on under the eye and advice of a friend in the business-it looked pretty good!
Weather tight, wait, this scratched up windshield has got to go!
Weather tight, Check! This 300ZX Convertible is coming together
Ok Tunes, Carpet, leather and fabric, the interior was next! Ireplaced the Head unit with the cd player I had in my 240Z before I stripped it and put on the rotisserie, and bought a new set of speakers-the car can rock!
Next I recovered the Steering wheel-huge improvement, I recovered the seats-massive improvement! I re-carpeted the car-the interior has arrived! Now the outside-a new bumper cover...painted to match! once that was done, the rest of the paint which didn't look that bad, looked terrible against the new paint...sooo I started knocking out the door dings and such, every little bit helped! But She Needed Paint, and some body work...and better than normal paint too!!